


Into The Breach

by Severina



Category: Oz (1997)
Genre: Community: hardtime100
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-01-07
Updated: 2010-01-07
Packaged: 2017-10-09 18:54:28
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,866
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/90464
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Severina/pseuds/Severina
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Genevieve's not exactly sure when Toby began to love alcohol more than her.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Into The Breach

**Author's Note:**

> Episode 102.  
> Prompt 27: Worth a Thousand Words [photo of barbed wire surrounding prison] (LJ's Hardtime100 Community)

"You don't have to do this," her mother says.

Genevieve pauses in putting the package of spaghetti into the picnic basket, flexes her hand over the plastic. "I do," she says without turning around.

She hears her mother sigh dramatically, hears everything her mother wants her to hear in that sigh. Hears _we were too permissive in your formative years_, hears _we never should have let you attend a New York college_, hears _you married too young_, hears _we always knew there was something wrong with that boy_. She knows that Toby has never quite graduated from 'that boy' status in her mother's eyes. Despite seeing her daughter's marriage last almost ten years, despite three beautiful grandchildren, despite the fact that they live in a glorious house with a tennis court and an in-ground pool. She's never been happy with Genevieve's choice of husband, even though Genevieve married up and out of… well, not exactly squalor, there were certainly country club fetes and riding lessons in her past, but the Beechers are old money, and…

Genevieve shakes her head, scatters the fragmented thoughts. "Mother," she says quietly.

"You know as well as I what you were planning to do," her mother says equally as quietly.

Genevieve's thoughts turn automatically to the desk. The Queen Anne's desk was her wedding present from Toby, the one item she'd always admired as a teenager every time her parents dragged her 'antiquing', the very word making her father turn up his nose, hide his sneer behind a hand so that her mother wouldn't see. She doesn't even remember telling Toby about it, but when they arrive home for their honeymoon the desk is sitting in one corner of the study, the requisite Big Red Bow tied around its middle. She had squealed, her hands flying to her mouth, feeling like a schoolgirl again and not a married woman. And then Toby was laughing and gently prying her hands away, turning her and smoothly lifting her onto the desk. She'd worried that the spindly little legs wouldn't hold her, wouldn't let them do what he wanted to do, and pictured the little desk collapsing, herself lying in a heap on the floor. But Toby had murmured against her ear, and held her waist so carefully, his big hands gentle, and eased inside her slowly, and her fears had drifted away.

What she remembers most about that moment is the way he looked at her. Like she was precious. Like he would never want anyone or anything more than her.

For the last three days the paperwork she received from Ted Ryerson has sat in one of the upper cubby-holes of the desk, the papers curling around themselves as they wait for her to make up her mind.

"Genevieve," her mother says with another sigh, this one saying _you never listen_. "I know you think you love that boy. But things have been bad for a long time."

Genevieve squares her shoulders, places the pasta into the wicker basket. Sets the sauce, homemade with chunks of green peppers and extra garlic just the way Toby likes it, next to it. She remembers endless hours up to her elbows in tomatoes, and the heat that summer, last summer, the way it simmered in the air like something alive, and the way her crisp clothes wilted and clung to her body in the stifling heat of the kitchen. Toby had come home early that day, his breath only smelling faintly of whiskey, had taken a taste of the sauce cooking on the stove and pronounced it the best she'd ever made. His smile had lit up the kitchen, making her feel cool and fresh.

She folds the napkins next to the sauce, then can't remember if the nun said whether there are cooking utensils in the… that place, so she opens the cupboard to get the strainer. Stares unblinkingly at a neat row of drinking glasses.

"Genevieve." Her mother's voice sharper now. "How many last straws do there have to be?"

She picks up a glass and slams it on the counter, feeling the vibration all the way to her shoulder. Behind her she hears her mother gasp, wonders worriedly if the children heard the noise. But a quick glance out the window shows her Gary and Holly still playing on their jungle gym, and there hasn't been a peep from the baby monitor in over an hour.

She takes a deep, shuddering breath before turning to face her mother, expects to see condemnation there. But what she sees on her mother's face is fear, and a little regret, and a kind of pity that makes her want to scream.

"Mother," she says, "don't do this."

"You're the one who's said for the past year that you're going to leave him," her mother says reasonably.

It has been a vague thought in her head, one that occurs on the bad days, the days when Toby sits bleary-eyed across from her at the breakfast table, his pores still leaking gin-soaked sweat from the night before. A traitorous thought, and one she never should have articulated to anyone, least of all her mother.

"My God, Genny, look what your life has become!" Her mother's hand grips the counter, inches away from the little wicker basket she'd picked up only yesterday from one of the cute little stores downtown, and Genevieve has the irrational urge to sweep the basket up in her arms, to hold it protectively against her chest.

"That boy is toxic," her mother continues relentlessly. "And any contact with him is toxic." She takes a breath, and when she speaks again Genevieve can hear the tremor in her voice. "It might have been you," she says. "It might have been Gary or Holly."

Genevieve shakes her head no automatically. He would never hurt them. Toby would _never_.

But Toby would also never hurt -- kill -- an innocent little girl, run her down with his car when she's just trying to make a few extra dollars delivering the paper, then vomit against the side of a police cruiser before being thrown in jail. He would never rip off his shirt on the dance floor at the office Christmas party, or spend all of Saturday grizzled and hungover in his bathrobe instead of taking his children to the park as promised, or eye the ass of the new office assistant when he's bending down over the water cooler.

Genevieve blinks. Surely she imagined that last.

"I just want what's best for you and the children," her mother says softly. She raises a hand, lets it hang in the air. "I love you, sweetheart."

Genevieve's not exactly sure when Toby began to love alcohol more than her. When sitting in a smoky bar became more important than sharing a meal with his wife and children. Or when a single glass of wine at dinner and a lazy evening of lovemaking became five or six drinks at lunch, a few more at dinner, a sloppy kiss and a grope in the dark. She thinks that if she could just find that moment in time, name and define it, she wouldn't have a sheaf of nasty papers labelled 'Dissolution of Marriage' hiding in her beautiful little Queen Anne's desk.

She feels her eyes fill with tears despite her best efforts to stop them, and absurdly the first thing she thinks is that she's going to ruin her makeup.

"Please," Genevieve says. There seems to be more she should say, but the words tumble around in her head and she can't focus on any single one even as she bows her shoulders under their weight.

Her mother hears them anyway. Genevieve lets herself be pulled into an embrace, holds herself stiffly until her mother's hand comes up to caress her hair, just like she would when Genevieve was a teenager and was facing the end of the world because Ricky Paulsen wouldn't talk to her or because she got a C minus on her grammar quiz and how was she supposed to get into an Ivy League school with grades like that? That gentle hand on her hair releases something in her chest, and she collapses into her mother's arms and lets the sobs come.

When the fountain finally runs dry, her mother holds her at arms length, produces a handkerchief from somewhere and daubs at her eyes. She eyes her critically. "You'll have to redo your makeup," she says, and Genevieve can only manage a watery half-smile and sniffle in response.

"You do whatever you have to do," her mother says, nodding and touching her cheek gently before stepping away. "Your father and I will be here to support you whatever you decide."

Genevieve remembers standing in the little antechamber of the chapel in Southampton, afraid to sit for fear of wrinkling her gown, and hearing the murmur of the guests in the main room as they awaited the familiar strains of the bridal anthem. Her mother had touched her cheek then too, and sighed, but it had been a happy sigh. Genevieve had heard _you're beautiful_ and _your father and I are so proud of you_ and had felt that she had the world at her feet, that with Toby's hand in hers she could overcome anything.

Her mother presses the handkerchief into her hand, and Genevieve looks at it for a moment before raising her eyes to her mother's face, where all the censure has been erased.

"Thank you," she says. When her mother smiles softly, Genevieve knows that she hears all the other words she wants to say.

She leaves her mother in the kitchen and takes the stairs to the second floor, ducks into the ensuite bathroom to reapply her mascara, slide a thin layer of gloss on her lips. She tucks her hair behind her ears, tugs her sweater down snugly over her breasts, and looks herself over in the mirror. Her thoughts are still flitting from place to place like fireflies in the dark, but her eyes are clear.

Before she leaves she picks up the pale blue scarf hanging from one of the racks in the closet, ties it loosely around her neck. The last time she wore it was the day they went out on Ted's boat. Lunch first, on the patio at the marina, large umbrellas keeping the sun off their faces, Toby downing three martinis to Ted's one but then stopping, smiling at her as he sent the waiter away. After, Ted navigating, his arm wrapped loosely around Rebecca's waist, and the water smooth as glass. Lying on the deck, Toby rubbing sun-block on her back, his hands kneading her shoulders and then slipping down to the sides of her breasts, nuzzling behind her ear while she giggled and warned him away before his partner noticed what he was doing.

It was a good day. It may have been the last good day.

Maybe Toby will notice the scarf, and remember. Maybe his big hands will again be gentle on her waist, and he'll murmur words of reassurance in her ear. Maybe there will be hope for them after all.


End file.
